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Topic: Queens Through The Mail (Read 2728 times)

I ordered 2 Queens from a local breeder for instalation last Saturday. Because I had intended to install them right away, and they should have arrived the next day, the queens were sent with out attendants per the breeder. This made sense to me since I would have let the attendants go any way. The queens were sent on Thursday the invoice arrived on Friday. The queens arrived today DOA. The breeder replaced the queens which was nice, but I did drive 3hr. round trip yesterday morning before work. Leason learned I guess would be include the attendants you never know when the mail will get mixed up.

Received a queen on 6/24 that my local bee supplier had ordered for another customer who decided not to pick up. She was in an envelope with attendants in her cage. Had been in envelope for 5 days. She had shrunken a bit....probably wouldn't have lasted another two days. Fed her sugar syrup and put her in hive....was released sometime on Monday or Tuesday. Suppose she's doing well now....attitude of hive has changed for the better. Comb building had ceased first week of this month. When I removed the empty queen cage from the hive on Tuesday, workers were festooning again drawing comb making room for her to lay.

It turns out that first class was .49 cents, and postage pade was .37 cents. The envelope clearly states Live Queen Bee's Please Deliver Quickly. It's a shame to waste two queens over .12 cents. Live and Learn.

Chad:Please do not base your decission on mail order queens on the actions of one shipper. That shipper must not be very knowledgeable or he would have neaver shipped her without attendants. She must have attendants every minute of every day after she has been bred, they are her link to life, the feed her, clean her and all the other chores, her only duty is to lay the eggs.I have ordered several queens without any sort of trouble and I'm sure there are thousands of others who have done the same. this is not to say there have been problems there has but the are few. The key of course is to deal with a repudule dealer. Sorry for your troublesBarnabus

No issue with the shipper they were very nice. I brought them a quart of organic strawberries from my garden, and enjoyed meeting with them.

If you introduce a queen to a new hive with attendants from another hive the attendants tend to fight with the bees from the new hive. A lot of people release the attandants before introducing the queen which was my plan. The shipper is with in one day first class mail, and figured they were saving me from having to release the attendants. The shipper has sent bees in the mail thousands of times so I figured what the heck. Thursday last week for some reason my shippment, and another shipment got snarled up over .12 cents.

I hear what you are saying though. I do not blame the shipper. I put it down to bleep happens, and wanted to share my experience so that this doesn't happen to others here on the board.

>If you introduce a queen to a new hive with attendants from another hive the attendants tend to fight with the bees from the new hive.

Rarely, but it can happen. I've introduced hundreds of queens successfully without releasing the attendants. I've only had a couple that failed and they were a hot hive and I should have released them on those hives since they already showed their temprament.

> A lot of people release the attandants before introducing the queen which was my plan.

If you're handy catching a queen, it's a good plan to let them go. If you're not, the odds of losing the queen while doing this are greater than the odds of the bees rejecting the queen because of the attendants.

Even if you do it in the window in a small room, there is still the issue of catching the queen and putting her back in the cage. This process, as with all that involve catching a queen, is best practiced with drones.

I wouldn't recommend a beginner to try releasing the attendants. If you're comfortable catching a queen then it's probably a good idea, but one I never bother to do.

Pull the cork out of the non candy end. Put your finger over the hole. When an attendant crawls down the tunnel let her out put your finger back over the hole. When there are no attendants left put the cork back in. Pull the cork off the candy end and install.

Robo I have heard of the veil trick. I think that they take the attendants out before they put the veil on though.

This guy told me about letting the attendants out he does a lot of direct releasing. Dan states that it is as effective as letting the workers get the queen out, and of course she gets to work just that much faster. Maybe it's a New England thing because I have heard others say the same thing. Which is why it did not strike me as insaine to send two queens in the mail with out attendants.

>Pull the cork out of the non candy end. Put your finger over the hole. When an attendant crawls down the tunnel...

Three hours later... :)

> let her out put your finger back over the hole.

While the queen decides to make a mad dash and you don't want to squish her...

> When there are no attendants left put the cork back in. Pull the cork off the candy end and install.

I've done it and I've made it work, but it's too tedious for me.

>Robo I have heard of the veil trick. I think that they take the attendants out before they put the veil on though.

lol

>This guy told me about letting the attendants out he does a lot of direct releasing.

I've done it, especially if it's an outyard and I won't get back for a while.

> Dan states that it is as effective as letting the workers get the queen out

I wouldn't say that, but it works well more than half the time assuming they've been queenless at least two hours and preferably overnight. But in an outyard I often do the two hours. Dequeen. Take a nice long break and install the new queens running them in with some smoke to cover their scent.